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STATEMENT OF SAM AHKEAH, CHAIRMAN, NAVAHO TRIBAL COUNCIL, SHIPROCK, N. MEX.------Mr. Ahkeah, Mr. Chairman and honorable committee. [Mr. Ahkeah spoke in Navaho for a short time.] I said--my delegation has traveled a great distance from the West to the East to the city of Washington where there is a Great White Father. We came to the honorable committee of Congress here to plead for our river rights, water rights, and I am sure today our people would be very happy that the delegation will be heard. I am Sam Ahkeah. My home is at Shiprock, N. Mex., on the Navaho Reservation, and I am chairman of the Navaho Tribal Council. I wish to make a brief statement to you on behalf of my Navaho people. My people have been waiting for a great many years for the time to come when we would be able to put to some beneficial use the waters which pass through our lands. We are like all other peoples living in the arid western lands, we can have visions of what water placed upon our lands will do, but we cannot translate these visions into effective action without help. It is beyond our means. Those of you who are familiar with Indian history in the Southwest may know that even 100 years ago and more my people were struggling to grow crops in the area which is still our land. The early white settlers and Army officers who came to New Mexico in the 1840's and 1850's found our ancestors growing wheat, corn, beans, and other crops. They found us with some well-developed peach orchards. They told of these things in their official reports and in their letters to friends. Kit Carson tells of the destruction of our fields and crops, and of our orchards in 1863 in order to starve us out so we could not fight. What irrigation we had in those days was very primitive, but even then we were trying in our own way to use the waters which God placed in the rivers running through our lands. When our people were taken to Fort Sumner, it was with the idea that they would be placed upon the land to become farmers. When;

STATEMENT OF SAM AHKEAH, CHAIRMAN, NAVAHO TRIBAL COUNCIL, SHIPROCK, N. MEX.------Mr. Ahkeah, Mr. Chairman and honorable committee. [Mr. Ahkeah spoke in Navaho for a short time.] I said--my delegation has traveled a great distance from the West to the East to the city of Washington where there is a Great White Father. We came to the honorable committee of Congress here to plead for our river rights, water rights, and I am sure today our people would be very happy that the delegation will be heard. I am Sam Ahkeah. My home is at Shiprock, N. Mex., on the Navaho Reservation, and I am chairman of the Navaho Tribal Council. I wish to make a brief statement to you on behalf of my Navaho people. My people have been waiting for a great many years for the time to come when we would be able to put to some beneficial use the waters which pass through our lands. We are like all other peoples living in the arid western lands, we can have visions of what water placed upon our lands will do, but we cannot translate these visions into effective action without help. It is beyond our means. Those of you who are familiar with Indian history in the Southwest may know that even 100 years ago and more my people were struggling to grow crops in the area which is still our land. The early white settlers and Army officers who came to New Mexico in the 1840's and 1850's found our ancestors growing wheat, corn, beans, and other crops. They found us with some well-developed peach orchards. They told of these things in their official reports and in their letters to friends. Kit Carson tells of the destruction of our fields and crops, and of our orchards in 1863 in order to starve us out so we could not fight. What irrigation we had in those days was very primitive, but even then we were trying in our own way to use the waters which God placed in the rivers running through our lands. When our people were taken to Fort Sumner, it was with the idea that they would be placed upon the land to become farmers. When;